The Magic of Broadway is Alive and Well in Fun Home

Who would think that a written memoir about a dysfunctional family in small-town Pennsylvania revolving around a funeral home and discovering one's sexuality could be made into a hit Broadway musical? And since the stage is surrounded by the audience on all sides, this show literally revolves.

Welcome to Fun Home, the show that is transforming traditional musical theater by creating something that is not merely enjoyable for audiences but that connects humor and heartbreak in a way that provides viewers with that post-theater feeling of needing to tell everyone you know to go see it ASAP. The story line, the music, and the talent will stick with you well after you have left the theater. In fact, the show will immediately capture your attention and hold it during its silent opening. (Note the strict "no late seating" policy.)

Fun Home is based on Alison Bechdel's 2006 graphic (comic-book style) memoir of the same name and has been adapted to the stage by Lisa Kron (Tony Award winner for Best Book of a Musical and Best Score of a Musical for Fun Home). The show consists of entertaining and deeply sentimental clips of Alison's life: There's Small Alison (age 9) played by the uber-talented, Tony-nominee Sydney Lucas (although her understudy Gabriella Pizzolo was on that night), Middle Alison (age 19) played by Tony-nominee Emily Skeggs making her Broadway debut, and Alison (age 43) played by Tony-nominee Beth Malone. Alison's parents are Helen (Tony-nominee Judy Kuhn) and Bruce (Tony winner Michael Cerveris). You may be noticing a Tony Award and nominee theme here. Fun Home took home five Tony Awards in total in 2015.

Brilliantly directed by 2015 Tony Award winner Sam Gold, the elder Alison watches and evaluates Small and Middle Alison throughout the show and provides unique, intelligent, and often hilarious insight into the story both when she is silent and watching as well as when she makes comments using words or lyrics. We do not see Alison age chronologically, rather we see her at her three pivotal ages during the show. Bruce, Alison's father, is a funeral home director in a small-town in Pennsylvania. He is also a high school English teacher and is borderline obsessed with restoring his Victorian house to museum-like condition. Alison's relationship with her father is the centerpiece of the story and she yearns for his acceptance, at times in ways that break the heart. Bruce is a closeted gay man; Alison is discovering that she is a lesbian. Although some of the story focuses on their knowledge and recognition of each other's sexuality, Small Alison also yearns for his acceptance of her cartoon drawings. Where father and daughter truly connect is through their love of literature, bringing out the compassionate and loving side of the at-times tyrannical Bruce. This bond is most evident during Middle Alison's college years while she is discovering her first same-sex love, Joan, played by Roberta Colindrez, whose comedic timing is virtually perfect.

The title "Fun Home" is short for funeral home and also is rather ironic given the not-so-fun feel at the Bechdel house for the kids under their father's rule. Alison's brothers John (8-year-old Zell Steele Morrow) and Christian (12-year-old Oscar Williams) liven up the show with the humorous commercial for their father's funeral home, "Come to the Fun Home," complete with dancing on a casket, seventies attire and a lemon Pledge microphone as well as the fabulous opening number "Welcome to our House on Maple Avenue."

Alison struggles throughout the story with her father's death at age 44. He is hit and killed by a truck shortly after Helen, his wife, admits she knows he is gay. This is also just after Middle Alison tells him she is a lesbian and pleads for support from her family. It pains Bruce to admit he is gay; Alison on the other hand feels like her life is finally beginning. We never know if Bruce's death is suicide or not, but the agony Alison experiences with his untimely death is brought to life with the line, "I had no way of knowing my beginning would be your end."

The music by Tony Award winner Jeanine Tesori is meaningful, creative, catchy, and relevant. Tesori's talent is noticeable by even the most novice theater-goer as the cast moves flawlessly from speaking to singing back to speaking all the while drawing the audience in to the intense story line and characters. The six-piece orchestra set on the stage enhances the value of the music in relation to the story. Ben Stanton certainly deserved his Tony nomination for lighting design- the lighting tells just as much of the story at times as the lyrics and music and contributes to the emotions the characters exhibit and the audience feels. David Zinn, the Tony nominated set designer, brings to life the family home, Alison's cartooning desk, the funeral home and college, a feat not easily reckoned with when audiences are seated around the entire perimeter of the stage. Furniture disappears and reappears thanks to some cleverly spaced trap doors.

"Changing My Major" sung by Middle Alison about the relief of accepting that she is a lesbian and changing her college major to Joan (her girlfriend) is a memorable number. It's sweet, funny, and well orchestrated. "Party Dress" is a truly gripping song partially sung and partly spoken with Bruce, Small Alison, and Middle Alison and is about Alison not wanting to wear a dress but pacifying her father by doing so. The most powerful song of the show has to be when Small Alison sings "Ring of Keys." Gabriella Pizzolo captured and relayed the intensity of the song- it is possible that no one in the audience blinked until it was over. The song was performed by Sydney Lucas at the Tony Awards and although they've got to be difficult shoes to fill, Pizzolo (Lucas' current understudy) is confidently and successfully moving into the role of Alison and will be performing regularly after Lucas leaves in October.

All three Alison's appear on stage together for the first time during the moving last scene, singing "Flying Away" and earning the genuine, zero-hesitation standing ovation at the end of Fun Home. The delight and satisfaction of the audience was palpable.

I had a chance to meet Oscar Williams who plays Christian in Fun Home. At 12, Christian is the oldest of five boys and hails from Vermont! His mom has learned to love NYC and all that comes with it and is managing quite well with one son on Broadway and four others at home. For Oscar, Alison's story is meaningful. "I like the truth and honesty that exists in Fun Home," he said. "It shows a person that accepted their self and a person that didn't and how their lives turned out differently. The Bechdels are a dysfunctional family that pretends to be perfect and there can be consequences to that."

And what are his thoughts about NYC versus Vermont? "Well everything is a lot closer. We just walk to the grocery store. School is just a few blocks away. Everything is huge and there are SO many people." Next on his plate? He hasn't really thought about it- he wants to stay with Fun Home as long as he can. Oscar thinks Finding Neverland, Matilda, or upcoming School of Rock could be really fun. But it will be hard to leave Fun Home. "The cast is so diverse and everyone is so talented. Michael and Judy are such amazing actors; Emily, Joel, Beth...Sydney, Zell, Roberta, Gabriella...everyone is so amazing and so connected on stage. We're really a family both on the stage and off the stage."

Fun Home is now playing at Circle in the Square, 235 W. 50th Street. Tickets can be bought on www.telecharge.com or by calling 212-239-6200.